Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Long Range Hunting Ladder test, How, why?

My methodology is pretty similar after I have done basic research to determine, bullet,primer, and powder combo I want to use/test for each ladder.

1. Shoot ONLY in early morning or evening in no wind conditions.

2. minimum of 300 yards prefer 400. I have found that seems to be the ideal distance for enough vertical dispersion as the bullets walk up and close enough to see bullet impacts with good spotting scope on white target.

3. 35P chrono

4. Minature paper target at bench to plot each round and another sheet to write down each MV for each round. That way I do not lose track of any bullet shot as each is numbered on plot sheet and anytime I go down range to verify impact.

5. Minimum of 1 minute between shots from starting dirty bore, I usually zero at that distance on another target at the side to confirm accurate zeroa for bottom of ladder target which is normally large plain white cardboard with 1" aiming dot near bottom. I use .3 grain for large cases and .2 for smaller cases as increments.

6. If I am not 100% sure of bullet location, I either walk down or use colored magic markers on bullet tips which show up on target. No they will not vary impact points on target. That is used all the time at 1K BR to identify any crossfires on your target.

7. MV as you go up will be linear until you hit a node and then it tends to decrease dramatically for that 2-4 shots and then jump linear again. You will see 3 rds with small MV variances normally in the node and then jump dramatically again.

Combination of bullet AND MV grouping confirms node and is usually easy to see when you compare the two!!

8. I pick a middle node, shoot groups to confirm basic accuracy and ES, SD nodes. I normally find 2 mabye three nodes, and one will be in the MV range I am looking for. Many times the top one is at the starting of high pressure point, so often do not use that one. Middle of the node gives me enough variance on temps and other factors that I am not out of the node on any given day.

9. Try groups at various seating depths at my best grouping and see what depth it likes. single shot gun start, .010 in and come out. Magazine gun, start at max magazine COAL and in from there.

10. If the gun will not shoot 1 MOA, that makes shooting a ladder a little difficult as you do not know what is the real vertical or 3-4MOA grouping "inability", so IMO it is not for every gun.